Rotherby /Gaddesby 2007
CAROL SERVICE
Doesn’t it strike you as strange?
Today is the time in the Christian year when we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus two thousand years ago in a stable in an Inn in a small village called Bethlehem.
But doesn’t it strike you as strange that we celebrate the birth of an obscure Jewish Carpenter who didn’t even live in the UK
And what is more, we have been celebrating his birth for a good 1000 years.
So I’d like to ask the question: Who was this Man and what was so special about him?
Even John the Baptist - that great revival preacher - after years in Herod’s dungeon started to have his doubts too
Jesus’ background
He was born in an obscure village, Bethlehem.
He was apparently the illegitimate child of a peasant woman, in a society where illegitimacy was a terrible birthright.
He was a member of a defeated race - a second-class citizen in his own country, with next to no rights at all.
He grew up in still another village, Nazareth where he worked with his stepfather in a carpenter’s shop until he was thirty.
2. His ministry:
Then for three years he was an itinerant preacher. He chose twelve men to be his closest associates. He trained them to preach His message. And in the end, they all deserted him.
He never wrote a book.
Yet what he has said - has been preserved over two thousand years in a book, the Bible.
And the Bible has been the best seller for centuries year in and year out. What is it about this book that fascinates?
His moral teaching is phenomenal.
Even those who were non-Christians have acknowledged that.
Mahatma Gandhi, for example rejected formal Christianity, yet found Jesus and his teaching fascinating.
Yet His teaching wasn’t politically palatable to many people
Alistair Campbell, the ultimate in spin doctors - would never have advised preaching a message of repentance of their sins. In fact if he had been Jesus’ press officer – Jesus would have been advised that “We don’t do God”
Jesus had a brilliant, sharp and incisive mind.
Let me give you an example of this brilliance.
One day, one of the finest Jewish lawyers wanted to set him up for a fall and so he asked him:
“Is it right to pay taxes the Caesar?
Jesus was in a no win situation.
If he said yes, the crowds – his main support would turn against him because Caesar was their oppressor.
If, on the other hand he said no he would be up on a charge of sedition before the Roman governor.
However he gave the Pharisees a quite brilliant answer. He asked for them to bring him a coin.
“Whose portrait is this? And whose inscription?” “Caesar’s” they replied
Then he said to them: Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s. (Mt. 22:21,22)
He never held a public office. If you want to make a name for yourself, you need to get the good and the great on your side.
The good – the religious parties all united against him. The great – the Romans ultimately crucified him.
He never had a family to pass on his family name and, so far as we know he never owned a house.
He never went to University or college.
He never visited the big cities of the Roman Empire, Rome, Alexandria or Athens to peddle his teaching.
In fact the only big city he visited was Jerusalem, which was in a backwoods of the Roman Empire.
Indeed, He never travelled more than 200 miles from the place where he was born.
He did none of the things we associate with greatness.
3. His death
He was only thirty-three years of age when the tide of public opinion turned against him.
His friends all deserted Him.
He was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a trial.
He was crucified, an ignominious and painful death - hanging on a cross between two thieves. While he was dying, his executioners gambled for his clothing, the only property he had on earth.
When he was dead, he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.
4. His movement
When the Prophet Mohamed (Islam) died, he left a powerful empire in place to enforce his teaching.
When the Buddha died - he left behind him a powerful group of followers in the Kingdom of Nepal to propagate his teaching.
When Jesus died, his followers and disciples fled and were scattered. For example Peter, James and John his main disciples returned to fishing in Galilee
Conventional wisdom would dictate that this is not a great way to start a worldwide movement.
And then when his disciples did get their act together they made that apparently ridiculous claim – that Jesus had risen from the dead.
What a preposterous way to start a movement – UNLESS THAT IS WHAT REALLY HAPPENED.
5. Prophecies
However, unlike the Buddha and Mohammmed, Jesus’ life and death fulfilled at least 52 different prophecies to be found in the Old Testament .
So clearly He was no ordinary man.
Conclusion.
So who was this remarkable man, whose birth we will be commemorating next week.
Mark at the beginning of his Gospel answers the question by saying that Jesus is the SON OF GOD.” (Mk 1:1)
John the Baptist said the same thing. At Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan, John said this: “I have seen and I testify that this is the Son of God” (Jn 1:34)
So I’d like to pose the question - What do you think?
Was He really the Son of God? Or was he merely a man?
C.S Lewis summed it up like this:
A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.
He would be either a lunatic – on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell.
You must make your choice.
Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or something worse… but let us not come up with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher.
He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
As we prepare for Christmas, the time when we remember Jesus’ birth, if he is the Son of God I wonder what our response to Him will be?
